Steinbeck Background Info. John Steinbeck 1902-1968 1902-1968 Believed in the political power of...
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Transcript of Steinbeck Background Info. John Steinbeck 1902-1968 1902-1968 Believed in the political power of...
Steinbeck Background Info
John Steinbeck
1902-1968
Believed in the political power of fiction and wrote to deliver a message
Born in California’s Salinas Valley
Worked a variety of jobs in his youth: fruit picker, painter, scientist’s lab assistant, etc.
Of Mice and Men (1937) was his first literary success
Won Pulitzer Prize in 1940 and Nobel in in 1962
Common Characteristics of
Steinbeck’s WritingMost take place in the Salinas Valley
Many works take place in the Great Depression
Works known as “Dust Bowl fiction”
Mostly focuses on the lower class
Steinbeck Novels
East of Eden
Of Mice and Men
Grapes of Wrath
Cannery Row
The Pearl
The Red Pony
The Moon is Down
The Grapes of Wrath
Steinbeck spent 2 years living and working with “Okies”
This experience inspired The Grapes of Wrath, for which he won the Pulitzer
Story of a family displaced from the Oklahoma dust bowl who found poverty and exploitation in California, in lieu of the wages and land for which they had hoped
Of Mice and Men
Concentrates on two displaced migrant ranch workers
Appears in the American Library Association’s list of Most Challenged Books of the 21st Century
Based on “To a Mouse” by Robert Burns
Quotes from To a Mouse
“The best laid schemes ‘o mice and men gang aft agley.”
“The best laid plans of mice and men often go astray.”